always break my fall *, mcgeezy/nikkipoo

you float through the door and i'm stumbling in again

alec hung up with jayla and immediately stared at the kitchen around him- the kitchen that was, despite his best assurances, still an utter disaster zone. no matter how many rules they put in place, it seemed as though the house was just never going to be clean. call it a hazard of storing too many boys in too small a space. fortunately the rest of his roommates were gone for the afternoon, whether at school or work or wherever else people usually went during this time of day. alec was just glad they weren't here. it meant that he could, for now, throw everything in the dish washer and sort out whether it was actually dirty or not later. it also was a wonderful way to avoid the otherwise unavoidable heckling that came with the crossing of anybody with a double-x chromosome over the threshold of their house, no matter who they were. it was also another reason that all four of them agreed that the basement was sacred grounds- it was the only door other than bedrooms that meant that the door was actually locked on purpose and not as a challenge to anybody else around to knock it down. not that nobody had ever tried, it had just been received poorly when it had happened. and since jayla had still only gotten back relatively recently, the more he could delay the inevitable run-ins between her and his roommates, the better. they were all good guys, it's just that that's exactly what they were- guys.

glancing over his shoulder at his cat, who was perched on the counter and apparently enjoying watching him slave to make the room somewhat presentable. it was a lost cause. "what?" he snapped good-naturedly at dak as he threw every single dish on the counter or in the sink into the dishwasher haphazardly. "i still have to take care of it later, so it's not like i'm doing anything wrong."

in all honesty, alec doubted that jayla would have cared that much if he had left everything out. she'd been over a couple of times before her sudden departure, even if it had been at the very beginning of their time renting the house, and it had never seemed to bother her before. still, alec very much enjoyed having jayla back in his life, even if he'd only had her back for a short time, and he wanted to keep it that way. she'd always managed to make him smile in a way that nobody else really made him smile in the same way that she did. it wasn't that she was funnier or smarter or more whimsical or anything like that… she was just funny, smart and whimsical in ways that were different from other people. and alec was allowed to appreciate that, right?

having contented himself to just remember to stop jayla before she ever came anywhere near the dishwasher, alec turned to face the now semi-clean kitchen and nodded appreciably. it wouldn't have won any awards but it didn't look like nobody had done the dishes in four days. moving over to the refrigerator, he pulled out a tub of cookie dough and started to plop it down on the conveniently clean cookie sheet on the counter. he hummed some randomly concocted medley of star trek themes to himself to help in his quest to refrain from eating all of the dough- he'd promised to make cookies so cookies he would make. they likely wouldn't be done by the time jayla arrived, unless she'd forgotten where he lived, which would be a travesty of a whole other realm, but at least he could make himself useful and put them in the oven.

alec couldn't help but be looking forward to spending quality time with jayla. it felt like he'd seen her in the park and then disappeared to the bahamas for spring break, where she was noticeably absent and then his schedule of working during the day while she took classes at night combined perfectly to make it feel like he really hadn't been able to spend much time around her. she had been- and still was- one of the most important people in his life and he felt like, at least right now, there was no such thing as seeing too much of her. maybe that's what happened when one of your best friends disappeared from the face of the earth for a couple months- you suddenly realized how much you regularly enjoyed their company. so when he heard the knock on the door, he popped up quickly enough to earn a reproachful hiss from dak and to stub his toe in the process. moving to the front door as quickly as he could while hobbling, alec still managed to have a wide grin on his face as he opened the door to see jayla on the other side. "gee, it took you long enough. i thought i was going to have to eat everything myself."

tagged: jayla/nicole. words: 837. notes: love you baby gurl.

THANK YOU, FOX!

jayla hung up the phone and just stared at it for a while. her iphone didn’t do any tricks while she stared at it, kind of in shock. she was going to be hanging out with alec tonight, watching a movie. this was all fine and dandy, quite normal actually. the two of them had hung out on plenty of occasions in high school and before she completely disappeared off the face of the earth to go into treatment. but after they had hung out in the park that day, chatting about all of jayla’s new problems and all of her baggage jayla kind of figured that maybe alec was going to avoid her until the end of time. sure he was super sweet to her when she told him, but that was just how alec was. he didn’t judge but jayla thought maybe this would be the breaking point. maybe he would see that jayla was a complete freak and ask never to see her again, but that wasn’t the case, and jayla was kind of shocked.jayla had called alec in a plan to maybe fix whatever problems she had made with their friendship by opening up to him about her problems. but apparently she hadn’t made any problems at all when she had opened up to him. that was the beautiful and amazing thing about alec, he truly wasn’t at all judgmental and there was no limit to that. jayla had assumed it would be impossible for her to have a friend that accepted her wholly but apparently she was able to find that in alec. with a heaving sigh she stood up and went to her bedroom to find something a bit more respectable to wear rather than the sweatpants she was currently donning. not that alec would really care what she was wearing, she was the kind of girl in high school that showed up with no makeup on, her hair in a bun wearing sweats and a pair of slippers. he has seen her not looking her best plenty of times. but for some reason jayla felt the need to make herself not look like such a mess. she wasn’t exactly sure what possessed her. but she threw on a pair of jeans and t-shirt anyways before grabbing her purse and keys.the walk to alec’s house was a bit from jayla’s so that gave her time to think. but maybe thinking wasn’t the best thing when you were kind of confused about your feelings towards someone. but for jayla, feelings didn’t exist, things just were, and she wasn’t going to be dealing with this whole issue. she was just going to put it into the back of her mind. because if she thought about it, it would just give her anxiety, and she just wanted an anxiety free time and, in general, life. that was the nice thing about alec, from was she learned in their time in the park, he didn’t give her anxiety. there was times when his comments put her on edge, but that was the same with anyone. even natalie, jayla’s old roommate, could say things to upset jayla, and she was the sweetest british crumpet she had ever met. but no, when she was with alec she felt at ease which was why she was fine with going over there.when she finally reached his house she stood outside for a moment taking a few cleansing and calming breaths. this was something she learned from the therapy she continued to go to. therapy really was helpful, despite what she might tell people about it. sure jayla complained a lot about the therapy she had to do and whatnot and how much she hated it, but deep down she knew it helped her. it was an outlet for her anxiety and her emotions. that way she didn’t boil over and scream at someone who accidentally brushed against her while walking. that was the kind of situation jayla wanted to avoid for dear life if she possibly could. she soon stepped up to the door and knocked upon it three times before waiting for it to swing open. when it did she smiled and let out a slight laugh, something only alec could make her do. “sorry i had to pull a kitten out of a tree. don’t you supposed ‘super heroes’ do stuff like that?” she said sarcastically, poking fun at alec’s super hero obsession. she slipped passed him into his home and looked around. “home sweet home, huh? feels like forever since i’ve been here.” she said appreciatively. jayla stuck her tongue out at the boy. “if you ate everything yourself i’d have murdered you, just so you know. and i’m a psycho, remember?” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. “i hope you’re ready for some good movie watching, since i get to choose and all.” she reminded him with a grin.i'll force madge 2 make this pretty tomorrow sorry it took so long i love you!

you float through the door and i'm stumbling in again

"only on our off days when we aren't busy making cookies for damsels in distress," alec replied jovially to jayla's comment without missing a beat. he was more than used to comments about his superhero obsession, having been getting them since middle school at least. but he couldn't help but grin because even if they were still sarcastic, they sounded much more friendly coming from jayla than from most other people. "but maybe it's time you joined our ranks and earned your own cape."

alec smiled lightly to himself as jayla entered the room, glad that she felt comfortable in his home, especially since jayla had never really been the type to settle into many social situations. alec had never really been that way- maybe he wasn't fully comfortable in his own skin in some of them, but he could manage in jus about any social situation there was. he considered making a joke about how she could do the dishes if she felt so at home, but he bit his tongue and refrained. instead, he just replied lightly, no note of accusation in his voice, "that's because it basically has been. welcome back to casa chaos." he started walking back to the kitchen, leading the way with the assumption that jayla would follow suit. as he went, he threw a childish look over his shoulder in return to her stuck-out tongue, wrinkling his nose and laughing. "ooh, you have me quaking in my boots. you could never kill me, let's be honest. who would make you cookies then?"

entering the kitchen, alec did a quick check of the cookie dough, popping the oven open just long enough to look at the rapidly cooking snacks before closing it again. he knew the phrase "a watched pot never boils" perfectly well, of course, but that didn't mean that he was going to obsessively check them. the one thing alec hated more than just about anything else in the world was a burnt cookie. cookies were supposed to be soft and delicious, not hard and gross. then again, he would have been perfectly content to just eat the cookie dough plain if it hadn't been for jayla, so there was probably something to that. leaning up against the counter and looking back at jayla, alec gave a short laugh at her final comment. "oh, i'm sure it'll be great since you have to pick from my movie collection." snickering, he shot a cheeky grin over at jayla. she had to have known what she was getting into when she came over here and there were probably three movies in his entire collection that couldn't be classified as science fiction or fantasy or action in some way. and they were buried somewhere at the bottom of the stack. whoops. not his fault. besides, transformers was an excellent movie, right?

at the end of the day though, alec didn't really care what the hell they watched. it could have been white chicks or some shit like that and he would have been okay with it. jayla was just one of those people who he enjoyed spending time with, no matter what they were doing- maybe because he knew that whatever it was, they'd still be talking through the whole thing so maybe it was better if it was something that he didn't get totally engrossed in. or that he felt the need to detail exactly what differences there were between the canon behind the movie and the movie itself. he still hadn't forgotten the time in high school when she'd socked him jokingly but painfully on the nose after he'd gone on for almost twenty minutes about how, while nolanverse batman was a very good adaptation, there were some minor changes to the structure of bruce wayne's relationship with jim gordon that he'd gotten wrong.

alec rummaged in one of the drawers until he procured two clean, albeit mismatched, spoons. offering one to jay as a peace offering, alec put his own on the counter lightly. he smiled at her and said, "but you still have full command of ice cream selection and we have enough ice cream here to sink a ship." opening the door of the freezer from where he stood, he waved a hand at the interior, jokingly saying, "i assume you still know your way around the inside of the refrigerator?"

tagged: jayla/nicole. words: 731. notes: sorry it took 4eva

THANK YOU, FOX!

jayla rolled her eyes, shoving alec a bit with her arm as she did so. “wow how come you didn’t save me from the most boring therapy session of my life?” she asked him pouting her lips out like a small child. “i honestly sat there and told completely random people i was bipolar. it was horrid.” she groaned shaking her head. it really had been an awful therapy session that she had been to last. it was one of the group ones she had been forced to go to. she had missed out on a couple due to “illnesses” which were actually her being too afraid to go. and it turned out as god awful and boring as she had expected. she confessed her disease to a group of strangers, that wasn’t something she had ever intended on doing. not in a million years. jayla smiled and tilted her head. “as long as my cape is purple i’m in. i’m pretty much your super hero anyways, saving you from boring lonely nights” jayla teased.jayla was nearly positive that the last time she had been in alec’s house was over a year ago, but the thing was… it was still pretty much the same. he probably had the same roommates who jayla was grateful were out of the house. she didn’t want to deal with boys, not today. she didn’t want to be gawked at. she had a nice body, something she was very aware of, but it made her disorder that much harder to deal with when people gawked at you. “feels like i’m home.” she commented before stretching her arms out. she really did love his place, no matter hiw chaotic alec seemed to think it’d get. with her brown hair falling into her face as she laughed, jayla managed to shake her head. “let’s be real, loony toons, i’m tougher than you and could probably kill you if i had an axe. and then when you were dead i’d threaten one of your roommates to make me cookies or i’d chop their heads off too.” jayla was clearly joking, though she managed to keep her voice steady. she winked at alec as she neared him in the kitchen. she could clearly smell the delicious smell of cookies that were cooking in the oven. in all honesty jayla hadn’t expected actual cookies, she thought alec had been joking, but clearly that was not the case. “i’m honestly surprised you actually made cookies. quite proud actually.” she said, wrapping her arms around him and squeezing. she rarely hugged people, so jayla pulled away quickly. it was weird being so close with alec, it made her heart pound.jayla sighed and crossed her arms over her chest, resting against the kitchen counter. she should have thought of bringing a movie from her own house for them to watch because all of alec’s movies were nerdy and probably boring to jayla. but she’d find something she liked. she saw transformers in theatres a while back with her family and she had honestly enjoyed it. maybe he had the second or third installments of the films. ah who was jayla kidding? of course he did. “gonna geek out on you for a minute and admit i love transformers, so why don’t we watch one of those?” they both would be happy with that movie selection.jayla accepted the spoon alec handed her and stuck her tongue out. “i’m only going to be kind to you today cause you’re giving me cookies and ice cream which is pretty much a bride to be nice.” she grinned and put her spoon in her mouth. she held it there while she watched alec open the holy grail of freezers. “holy shit…” she managed to spit out, staring at the freezer which was chalked full of ice cream. she placed the spoon in her mouth before walking towards it, her eyes rolling. “nope, totally forgot. i’m a damsel in distress, save me please.” she joked, nudging him as she did so. she walked to the freezer and stared in awe at all the flavours that were available to her. jayla picked out a tub of bubble gum before closing the freezer.“now,” the brunette began, opening the tub if ice cream and sticking her spoon in. “let’s get our sugar high movie marathon started!” she grinned widely, moving her hips in excitement.

you float through the door and i'm stumbling in again

alec gave a sympathetic smile; it really did sound like a terrible thing that he had to do and he didn't envy that particular part of jayla's life at all. it sounded awful and he knew that he should probably say something comforting but he couldn't think of anything off the top of his head so he left it at a simple, "i'm sorry. i didn't get my superhero rescue signal." but then he laughed and his usual comfortable happy mannerisms returned as, without bidding, the image of jayla in full superhero attire popped to mind. maybe it was because he mostly saw her as a relatively assuming person, but the image made him crack up and he just shook his head, saying, "purple it is. you would make an awesome phantom on top of being my personal hero."

"baby looney tons, eh?" alec laughed, giving jayla a light, friendly punch on the shoulder. at the end of the day, she was probably right. alec wasn't a confrontational sort of person and he'd never had to suffer through the torture of being a brother. the worst he got was occasionally being tackled by one of his roommates and fighting back to avoid being completely squashed. otherwise, he was about as threatening as a baby butterfly and everybody knew it. still, he couldn't help but snickering as his eyebrows went up. "i see that you're still secretly training for the mafia. but you wouldn't have to threaten them, they all love you anyways. and my dead and bleeding body would be fair warning."

alec felt actual surprise when jayla spontaneously hugged him. he knew that she wasn't a physically intimate person- she never had been, even back in high school before he'd known that she was bipolar. he didn't know if the two simple facts had anything interrelated to do with each other but he guessed they probably did. he embraced her back, locking his arms around her briefly before she pulled away. he was reminded of the last time that they had hung out and she'd seemed uncomfortable when he'd given her even a one-armed hug; compared to then, this seemed like a big leap and it made him stupidly happy without him really knowing why. he didn't even mind when she pulled away quickly- it still left him with an undoubtedly stupid smile on his face. but he just shrugged and replied, "well, i couldn't really let you down now could i?"

that and he had plenty more cookie dough stashed in the refrigerator so he could always eat that later.

"pfft," alec scoffed, rolling his eyes. "if you think that wanting to watch transformers is geeking out, then you clearly have never met me." transformers would work. that would be good. "i'm so proud of you," he joked, referring to her admission of a soft spot for the movies. really though, what wasn't to love about them? they weren't nearly as hardcore as they could have been but they struck just about the right balance between action and comic wit and pure, beautiful cgi beauty to keep him happy. and of course, he owned the director's edition of every single one- the first even with the signatures of shier and megan themselves, thanks to his sister. his movie collection was actually probably worth a pretty penny thanks to his connections and the fact that he'd been toted along to premiers of some of the older ones when he was younger and was taken everywhere with his dad. then again, the number of people who could appreciate his collection was small so maybe that wasn't quite so true.

"but of course that is an acceptable selection- you get to pick which one. but!" alec waved his spoon at jayla in mock threat. "if you choose the third, i can't be your friend anymore."

he fake pouted as he stuck his own spoon between his teeth, retorting swiftly, "wow, glad to know that our friendship runs deeply." he laughed though, all pretenses of being upset with her vanishing as she realized just how much junk food was tucked into their freezer. it was a true feat, and he was slightly surprised that nothing had fallen out due to the overstuffed nature of the storage space. reopening the freezer after she shut it, alec joked, "i see they aren't teaching taste at damsel finishing school anymore though." selecting a particularly delicious pint of ben and jerry's out of the rubble for himself, he turned to face her, a grin on his face.

"yes, let's. but first, let's rescue some cookies." setting his ice cream on the counter but maintaining a protective eye over it just in case jayla decided to try to steal any. using a hot pad sitting on the counter, he quickly pulled the just-slightly-underbaked cookies from the oven and set them on the top of the stove, poking one appreciatively. it was still a little gooey but he wasn't going to run the highly likely risk of forgetting about them once they headed downstairs. using his spoon, he lifted approximately three cookies-worth of cookie off the baking sheet and plopped it on top of his bowl. "help yourself," he added, gesturing toward the sheet. after successfully balancing the cookie mass on his ice cream, he picked up the bowl and spoon and grinned to match hers.

"now i believe we're ready," he proclaimed, starting to lead the way to the awaiting television in the basement.

tagged: jayla/nicole. words: 917. notes: xoxo

THANK YOU, FOX!

jayla was excited to be hanging out with alec like this. normally things like this didn’t make jayla excited, in fact they did quite the opposite. whenever she was partnered with someone in school - whether it be high school or stratton - jayla would groan and moan about it to herself until she finally forced herself to their house or invited them to hers to do their work. she dreaded those things, being alone with someone and being forced to have conversation. what if things got awkward? what if she flipped out? but with alec, it didn’t really matter. he knew about her issues and things never got awkward around him. he was really good at dealing with awkward, probably because he was so awkward himself. but jayla was glad he was. she was also glad she was calm. she had gone to a therapy session and taken her pills, she was in a great place right now, and having alec with her made it even better.jayla shook her head in mock disappointment. “i’ll make sure never to rely on you again.” she said with mock horror. as much as group therapy had sucked, she could admit that it did help. she hated it, but it was nice to be able to get that kind of stuff off your chest to people who wouldn’t judge and hear about people with similar issues. she didn’t feel so alone when that kind of thing happened. it was nice to feel not so different for once. but it still sucked. “i’ll make being your personal super hero my top priority. even over national disasters and whatever i have to deal with.” because obviously jayla was going to be a real super hero one day, duh.jayla nodded secretively at the mafia comment. “i’m not supposed to talk about it, but it’s actually super villian training. no big.” she rolled her eyes. everything with alec always had some kind of crazy back story. she was training for the mafia or she was a super hero. it was fun though, she liked that she was able to be weird and not feel like she was about to have a panic attack over it. thankfully jayla had yet to feel the familiar tickle of panic and anxiety roll through her stomach which was a great thing about alec (to add to the list of many) he didn’t make her panic. only when he threatened to jump out of trees and hugged her unexpectedly. but there was no trees here and jayla was growing to not loathe physical contact (thanks therapy!) so neither of those seemed as if they were going to be issues in this situation. “speaking of the boys who love me, where are they anyways?” she asked. usually she had to deal with an onslaught of boys when she came to alec’s but today they were seemingly alone, it was a welcomed change.in proof of jayla’s diminishing distaste of contact with other people, she hugged alec and he hugged her back. she could feel his shock at this gesture, but jayla was appreciative that he didn’t just pull away. sure their hug was a bit weird, but she didn’t care. it was a hug, something she rarely did, and it was nice. but after the awkwardness the two of them went back to being their normal selves with their normal friendship. “for me, transformers is geeking out. you’re lucky i’m not asking you to watch something with channing tatum in it.” she joked. jayla wasn’t a big chick flick fan in the first place, she preferred comedies, but she wanted to make both herself and alec happy, and transformers seemed like the best bet, geeky or not. jayla rolled her eyes and held her hands up in defense of alec waving his spoon. “i’m choosing the first one mr. tough guy.” she told him. jayla laughed and rolled her eyes. who didn’t like bubble gum flavoured ice cream? it was pretty clear that this was one of alec’s roommates icecream, but jayla didn’t mind. there was so much in here there was no way that anyone would notice something missing. and if they did she would buy them a new one. hopefully they didn’t get too upset with her though, because she didn’t want to end up freaking out. but that was thinking too far ahead, making things worse than they needed to be. jayla took a breath. “bubble gum is delicious, you’re just jealous.” when alec pulled the cookies out before they went down stairs jayla felt her stomach rumble slightly. though exceptionally gooey, they were cooked and looked absolutely delicious. jayla also took three cookies for herself and followed alec down the stairs into the basement. once they had gotten there she flicked on the light switch and flopped herself down on the couch, cookies and ice cream in hand. “since i’m your guest you have to start the movie!” she said, sitting up on the couch on the right side, but not right against the arm of the couch. she and alec were friends, they were allowed to sit near each other during the movie. “and remember. we’re watching the first iron man. don’t stick star wars in, please.” she joked.

you float through the door and i'm stumbling in again

"now that would be a damn shame on all counts," alec countered lightly, taking absolutely no offense to jayla's words. there was a truth behind his woods though that even his light tone couldn't cancel out. he really did hope that jayla knew that she could always rely on him if it was something serious that she needed his help with- sure, he was probably likely to bumble his way through stuff and not actually come up with any decent solution, but he was willing to help in whatever way he could. and it had been a long enough time since he and jayla had really spent time that he was slightly worried that she might have forgotten. especially if she had new friends from her therapy group- however much she hated it, surely there were people who were better suited to help her than alec. yet he was here and none of them were (though admittedly it would have been incredibly freaky if they were) so that had to count for something, right?

alec snorted, rolling his eyes at jayla. he couldn't help it, since he was half-convinced that the only reason she said half of the stuff she said around him was just to mollify his childish love for superheroes. but he appreciated it nonetheless and if she was game for a laugh over it then all the better. he shook his head in mock horror though, raising his eyebrows and exclaiming, "what?! have you been holding out on me? i hope that you're just in it to steal their secrets."

alec just laughed as jayla asked about his roommates, shrugging and glancing around the house as if looking for some other people to mysteriously appear. he didn't really know how jayla honestly felt about his roommates- he'd never asked because he just sort of assumed that since they teased her but treated her like a sister, everybody was fine with everybody else. besides, he'd known jayla for long enough that he figured if worse came to worst, he could tell them to cram it and it would be fine. when nobody else appeared, alec joked, "you're right, everybody who loves you has vacated the building." but then he just shrugged, brushing it off and shaking his head. "nah, they're just all out doing whatever it is they do. having lives." alec didn't really bother keeping tabs on his roommates- they all came and went as they pleased and as long as they didn't lock him out as they did.

"with who? oh!" alec's eyes lit up a little as he finally placed her reference. "g.i. joe! that movie could have been a whole lot worse." he highly doubted that that was the exact chaining whats-his-face movie that jayla had had in mind- at the end of the day, she was a girl and he didn't know a single girl who honestly preferred action movies to cheesy romantic comedy crap. but as for himself, he had absolutely zero knowledge of any of his other filmography so it wasn't like he could really pick or choose other names to drop. but he just laughed, dropping his spoon and popping it into his mouth instead. "and i know! we made a deal and i'll stick to my end."

"and i am certainly not jealous." alec laughed lightly. jayla seemed a lot more relaxed than in their last encounter and he liked this side of her. she hadn't been uptight on their last meeting, per se, but she had seemed to be a lot less calm than she did now. she just seemed more comfortable- maybe it was because she was on a more familiar stomping ground? or maybe whatever therapy they were doing with her at the treatment place or wherever she did her therapy was working and she was able to feel more at home in daily life. whatever it was, alec liked the side of jayla that was able to joke around. in turn, he felt more relaxed, more like he was able to to be the guy just hanging out with her that he had been back in their high school days. it was nice. popping spoonful of his ice cream into his mouth, he took particular relish in the fact that it wasn't disgustingly sweet. "mmmmm cherry garcia."

once in the basement, alec put his ice cream and cookie mix on the table sitting by the couch and went and perched in front of the stack of movies. "as long as you don't eat my ice cream, we're fine. and i've loaned my copy of star wars, you're in luck." after finding the right transformers movie and sticking it in the beaten up dvd player, alec crossed the room in a couple steps and hopped onto the couch, landing about a foot from jayla. as the title screen came up and he pressed play before tossing the remote onto the table, he picked up his own ice cream and cookies. keeping on eye on the screen even though he probably could have recited every line to this movie in his sleep, alec reached over and pinched off a piece of one of the cookies in jayla's bowl, shoving it in his mouth before she had a chance to react. "mmm i'm a good cook," he teased, holding his own bowl on the side of his body away from where she was sitting in self-defense.

tagged: jayla/nicole. words: 909. notes: xoxo

THANK YOU, FOX!